Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 81423 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81423 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
As I stood there, hearing his words echo through my head, it was as if a switch was flipped inside me. Like I’d been off all these years and somehow I was suddenly lit up. And what I found when I could see was anger. It burned through me, devastated my insides.
This was what it would always be unless I made changes. Unless I did something. I could love Law and come out, but none of it mattered, not really, unless I fought all the battles that needed to be fought. Until I armed myself and shut off the outside noise and fought.
I’d spent my entire life doing whatever was necessary for my music, for my family, but I’d never, ever fought for myself. I hid behind my career and my anxiety, putting a Band-Aid on the issue, but that’s all it ever was, a superficial masking, a facade I’d become too comfortable living behind.
And it would kill me.
It was already killing me.
“I really am sorry, kid.”
“Are you? You seem to ignore me when it’s convenient.”
There was a short pause before he said, “Because I had a feeling this would be the case, and I didn’t know how to tell you. And I also worry about you. Maybe you don’t believe that, but it’s true.”
The thing was, I did believe him. Steve was cutthroat. He’d been in this business a long time, but he cared. “That doesn’t make ignoring me okay. I’m an adult. I know what I’m ready for.” And I was ready for this.
“Fair enough. What are we doing here? I’ll support you no matter what.”
“I gotta go.” It was time to do this, and I wanted to do it alone.
“Wait. Remy—” Steve started, but I ended the call. My cell immediately rang again, but I tossed it on the bed and walked out.
I didn’t know what was leading me. It was like I had no control. I’d been tired for so many years, maybe my whole life, but no matter how many times I acknowledged it, I still accepted it. I couldn’t do that any longer.
When I got into the living room, Mom was on the couch. Leslie was there, typing on her phone, and Martin had come too. It was the first time I’d seen my brother since I’d been home.
They all looked at me as if they noticed a change in the room, as if there was a charge in the air, and I thought maybe there was. And it was coming from me. “I can’t…I can’t do this anymore,” fell out of my mouth.
“Remy?” Mom asked. Her hands had her all-familiar tremor to them. Martin frowned. Leslie crossed her arms.
“Do what?” my sister asked.
“All of it. Everything. I need…I need help.” For years I’d popped pills while keeping everything inside, but that was the extent of it. I stood by the use of medication. I knew people needed it, I needed it, but I never let myself go further than that. I never talked. My doctors had even stopped trying to get me to before writing a prescription every month, but the truth was, I couldn’t blame them. There was no one to blame but myself.
“Sweetheart…what’s…wrong?” Mom asked.
Leslie huffed and rolled her eyes. “Your life is perfect, Remy. You’ve always been perfect. The great savior. Mom’s favorite. The talented one. The only one anyone ever really believed in.”
And there it was. The resentment in her voice was clear in each sharp edge of her words.
“You don’t know shit about me. I have what I have because I worked my ass off. Because I sacrificed everything.”
“You left!” Leslie shoved to her feet.
“Everyone calm down,” Martin said. That had always been him. He kept to himself, didn’t ever take a stand, but tried to keep the peace.
That had been me too, but not anymore. “I left so I could do this!” I waved my hands all around the room. “You sure as shit don’t mind taking from me, do you? It’s real easy for you to look at me from the outside and think my life is perfect, that I got handed everything, but I’ve killed myself for what I have, and the whole time, you took from me while being angry with me, and no one cared that I was dying inside. You know. Come on, you all have to know!”
The room was silent except for the sound of our breathing. My chest hurt as we all stared each other down.
“You used to play with me,” Leslie said softly. “Do you even remember that? Showing me how to play the guitar? Singing to me? Letting me sing with you? It felt like it was ours, and then you just…left. You cut yourself off from us, from me. You say that all I do is take money from you, but that’s all you’ve been willing to give. You say we have to know, and maybe I know something is up with you, something has been up with you for a long time, but you shut me out of that, Rem. You left me, and all you cared about was music. I didn’t know my brother anymore. You closed yourself off, kept secrets, didn’t talk to us, but money, you could always give that, so don’t pretend it’s me, that it’s us. You’re as guilty as we are.”